The present invention relates to a method of selecting the needles of a knitting machine, particularly a household hand-knitting machine, and more particularly a method of selecting needles of a knitting machine in order to effect operation of the needles in accordance with a recorded pattern by reading out the recording medium wherein a profile of the pattern to be knitted is permanently stored.
A conventional needle-selecting method is one whereby a profile of the pattern to be knitted is recorded in a card in the form of multistage punched hole configurations. The punched holes of each stage are mechanically detected and mechanically recorded in a mechanical memory in the form of a group of needle-selecting signals. The desired needle group may then be selectively actuated in response to carriage movement.
Such conventional needle-selecting methods are disadvantageous in that the recording operation necessitates minute attention because the punch holes must be arranged in predetermined positions on the card in order to produce a profile of the pattern to be knitted. In other words, the profile representing the unit pattern to be knitted must first be separated beforehand into profile modules (corresponding to the respective aforementioned punched holes, or minimum composite units of the pattern) which must be sequentially arranged for proper recording.
That is, the profile indicating the whole unit pattern must be digitally recorded in the form of profile modules, each corresponding to one needle. Such methods of needle selection, however, have an important drawback in that the number of needles in one group employed in knitting a unit pattern cannot be altered, whereby the size of the unit pattern cannot be freely changed.